DeLorean is back from the past

A row of DeLoreans sit outside the DeLorean Motor Company in Huntington Beach. The cars were made from 1981-83 and were known for their stainless steel body and gullwing doors. About 9,000 of the cars were made.

The 30th anniversary of the classic time-traveling movie “Back to the Future” isn't until 2015, but DeLorean Motor Co. is already seeing a steady uptick in business for restorations of the stainless steel cars, complete with flux capacitors, plutonium gauges and the Mr. Fusion nuclear reactor that enabled the iconic coupe to travel to 1955 – at least on film.

Recently relocated from Garden Grove to Huntington Beach, the DeLorean Motor Co. had been making a business out of simply restoring the beloved, if short-lived, DMC-12 sports car. But increasingly, it's fielding requests to transform them into time-traveling replicas for a whole host of events, including corporate appearances, movie cameos and, next month, the happily married car that will transport a newlywed couple after their nuptials.

Last weekend, DeLorean Motor Co. mechanic Danny Botkin drove his personal “Back to the Future” car to San Francisco for an Uber promo, offering free rides through the popular socially networked ride-sharing service.

“‘Back to the Future' is getting bigger and bigger, especially among kids who watched the movie in 1985 and now have enough money to own a piece of it,” said Botkin, who has built six of the movie replica cars so far.

Pull open the gullwing doors, and the center console is outfitted with a stack of “time circuits” that allow passengers to punch in a “destination time” that can transport them decades into the past or future – at least in the drivers' own minds. Pull a lever, and the “flux capacitor” that “makes time travel possible” using 1.21 gigawatts of electricity, according to the film's Doc Brown character, pulses with lights that flash from a box between the head rests.

Botkin, who began work as a DeLorean mechanic at the now defunct Garden Grove DeLorean Motor Co. franchise 13 years ago, had purchased a decrepit DMC-12 for $3,000 to restore for personal use when he was approached by a rep for Universal Studios, asking if he could restore the original “Back to the Future” car for a possible fourth installment of the film.

“After working on that and getting their car running, it gave me the bug to do mine,” said Botkin, who took “tons of pictures.”

Those photos have become a handy guideline for the replicas, which cost about $45,000 and source parts from military surplus, including a jet engine oil cooler and oil separator. The “nuclear reactor” is a Krups coffee grinder. Its base: the housing for a computer hard drive.

“We've never advertised that we build these,” Botkin said. “It's just been a side thing we do. If people ask us to do it, we'll do it.”

The current DeLorean Motor Co. has nothing to do with the original DeLorean Motor Co. Founded by General Motors executive John DeLorean in 1975, the original went bankrupt in 1982 when it ran into cash-flow problems after building about 9,000 cars. Its modern incarnation was established by British auto mechanic Stephen Wynne, who serviced DeLoreans from his San Fernando Valley garage when the original company was building cars, and, in 1995, started a different DeLorean Motor Co. after buying the original company's remaining parts.

According to Wynne's son, and current DeLorean Motor Co. general manager, Cameron Wynne, there are still enough original DeLorean parts to fill 40,000 square feet of warehouse space in Houston. Original gullwing doors alone number 1,000 in inventory, he said.

The Wynnes' DeLorean began re-manufacturing the DMC-12 seven years ago using donor cars that are stripped to their underbodies and upfit with a mix of re-manufactured and new, old-stock parts. Wynne won't say how much the donor cars cost, but he says they are readily available and oftentimes have just a few thousand miles on the odometer.

In 1981, a new DMC-12 cost $25,000. Today, that same car in good condition is worth about the same amount. Of the 9,000 DMC-12s that were built, 6,500 are estimated to still exist.

“We constantly have customers calling us that have had their cars in storage for 10, 20, 30 years, and they want to get rid of it,” said Wynne, whose shop does “Back to the Future” and frame-off restorations, upgrades that boost the PRV engine's stock 127 horsepower to 197 as well as more mundane work, such as oil changes.

DeLorean operates six locations – in Huntington Beach, Houston, Seattle, Chicago, Naples, Fla., and the Netherlands. All of the U.S. locations are within a day's drive for DeLorean owners to have their cars serviced by a DeLorean specialist, Wynne said.

“I've grown up around DeLoreans my entire life. I was dropped off to kindergarten in the actual ‘Back to the Future' car. A DeLorean was my first car at age 16,” said Wynne, who drives his personal DMC-12 on weekends. “‘Back to the Future' has been a huge part of the business. The car is so well known from a 90-year-old person to a 4-year-old because of that movie. That shows how timeless the car and the brand is.”

Soon, DeLorean will begin producing a different sort of “Back to the Future” car – an all-electric DMC-12 that can travel 100 miles per charge and accelerates from 0 to 60 in 4.4 seconds. In 2011, the company built its first DMC EV. It is currently “revamping the battery system,” Wynne said. “Once battery technology jumps up, we can introduce the next EV.”

A row of DeLoreans sit outside the DeLorean Motor Company in Huntington Beach. The cars were made from 1981-83 and were known for their stainless steel body and gullwing doors. About 9,000 of the cars were made.
Service manager Danny Botkin, left, and general manager Cameron Wynne at the DeLorean Motor Company in Huntington Beach. PAUL BERSEBACH, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
A flux capacitor sits between the driver and passenger seats in a replica of the DeLorean time machine from the "Back to the Future" movies. The car is owned by service manager Danny Botkin of DeLorean Motor Company in Huntington Beach. PAUL BERSEBACH, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
Mechanic Al Mercado puts the grain back in the stainless steel of a DeLorean. PAUL BERSEBACH, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
The unit to select a destination in time sits on the dash in a replica of the DeLorean time machine from the "Back to the Future" movies. PAUL BERSEBACH, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
A gauge for the plutonium chamber sits on the dash in a replica of the DeLorean time machine from the "Back to the Future" movies. Plutonium is what powered the car in the movies and made time travel possible. PAUL BERSEBACH, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
The interior of a replica of the DeLorean time machine. PAUL BERSEBACH, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
The engine in a replica of the DeLorean time machine. PAUL BERSEBACH, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
This interior of this DeLorean is in near perfect condition at the DeLorean Motor Company in Huntington Beach. PAUL BERSEBACH, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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